Tasting Notes - a little fortification after the footy
Choose the right wine every time - Taste Food and Wine 2008 by Matthew Jukes and Tyson Stelzer
End a magnificent season of footy in style. Adding a few bottles of these premium sticky and fortified wines to your AFL Grand Final week will make it a very memorable celebration (or commiseration).
Keith Tulloch Botrytis Semillon 2006
$27
Viscous but not cloying in any way, perfectly restrained in every proportion, Keith Tulloch has engineered another precisely-tuned Semillon sweetie this year. Its lemon butter and spice flavours will ascend to ever-higher planes of honey heaven as it ages. This unctuous Semillon is now my (Matthew’s) wine of choice when I entertain my French friends. While they deliberate about Cru and Commune I smile and feel ridiculously smug.
Turkey Flat Pedro Ximénez NV
$30
Turkey Flat’s PX is a delightful boozy raisin creation, which sidles up to you and while you’re not looking repeatedly bashes you over the head with a large and heavy stick and then plants a huge smacker on your lips which has the effect of leaving you feeling dazed, dizzy and moderately aroused in one go – odd, but we are not complaining.
Joseph la Magia Botrytis Riesling Traminer 2006
$31
Tinkerbell has come to visit and she will conduct her business via the medium of wine. La Magia is her favourite tipple and you will fall for its seductive power, too. Fresh and lively tropical and stone fruit flavours flit around the glass, casting spells on anyone within reach. This is a stunning wine.
Jackson Estate Marlborough Botrytis Riesling 2006
$32
By contrasts to Forrest’s wine below, this is a clean, crisp sweetie, beautifully concentrated, citrus-imbued and with pronounced acidity. Elegant, calm, long and balanced, you could conceivably drink it instead of pudding rather than with pudding. One bottle each, to celebrate your Christmas bonus!
Mount Horrocks Cordon Cut Riesling 2006
$34
Every year, Steph’s sweetie makes the hit parade. She leads the pack and the pack seems to have stopped chasing. This is a wonderful treat with a magical flavour that we never tire of.
Forrest Estate Botrytised Riesling 2006
$35
This is one of the best sweet wines from New Zealand and its fresh, clean, pure stone fruit and exotic fruit palate is a joy to behold. Cold rhubarb fruit compote with shortbread must be the ideal dish for this wine. Good work, Dr John.
Lark Hill Auslese Riesling 2006
$35
Lark Hill is in a cool, high altitude place near Canberra and these conditions provide the perfect environment for creating decadent sweet wines. Auslese is German for “selected harvest” and refers to grapes harvested later and hence riper and sweeter than normal. This desperately sexy wine makes a spectacle of its fresh grapefruit and candied orange peel flavours.
Campbells Classic Rutherglen Muscat NV
$42
There’s real balance here. All in all it’s the most balanced sweetie in our list – flavour, price, bottle design – it’s got it all. It says on the back that it should be splashed over ice, but we prefer splashing it over girlfriends (oops!).
Campbells Grand Rutherglen Tokay NV
$65
This is every chocolate cake that any favourite granny has ever made in a glass. Its heroic intensity leaves an oil slick of decadence on your palate. Surrender to the power of the dark side. Your feeble skills are no match for this wicked wine from Dark Lord Colin Campbell.
Campbells Merchant Prince Rare Rutherglen Muscat NV
$105
This wine would floor a stegosaurus! You can invert your glass and none will come out, it’s so unctuous. People say a wine has a long finish, but when you put this in your mouth, all the wines you thought had a long finish suddenly seem pretty short. Waves of dramatic, white-knuckle flavour crash onto the palate and it is hard to concentrate during the cacophonous action. Let’s adjourn to somewhere more comfortable because we think it is illegal to enjoy this wine while vertical.
Reproduced with permission. © Copyright Matthew Jukes and Tyson Stelzer 2007
Taste Food and Wine 2008 is available from book retailers, department stores and wine outlets. Taste Food and Wine 2009 is available from October 3, 2008.
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